


the perfect accouterment

by advantagetexas



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, more in a 'its 6am and im half dead move the fuck over because we're sharing' type way, okay so there's sharing of a shower but not in a frisky way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-09
Updated: 2016-05-08
Packaged: 2018-06-07 07:45:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6795334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/advantagetexas/pseuds/advantagetexas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are two very specific things that William Poindexter is extremely thankful for. The first thing is that one night during an epikegster, everyone in the haus got drunk enough to let him sleep on the couch. The second thing is that he's extremely thankful that he spent an entire year getting over his hatred for a certain Derek Nurse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. anything other than what we've learned to expect

It had been the morning after an epikegster, the sun just rising on the horizon. Dex woke up on couch with what could arguably be considered the world’s worst hangover. He groaned and dragged a hand over his face before realizing that oh dear lord he _slept_ on the haus couch. He was probably going to die now, or at least need several decontamination showers.

He got up, his knees creaking slightly with the effort, and stopped by his kitchen on his way upstairs. There was a tray of minipies cooling on a rack, and he couldn’t help but smile when he saw the note on top.

_“For the drunk frogs (ps: Dex, I’m awfully sorry that we let you sleep on the couch)_

_-Bitty”_

Dex took one from the pan, saying “thanks, mom” before he could stop himself. He looked around to make sure that no one had heard that. They had chirped Chowder relentlessly when he had accidentally called Bitty and Jack “mom and dad” once, and he was not about to have a redux of that. Thankfully, there was no one else in the kitchen, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

He polished off three of the little pies before deciding that he should probably stop. He wandered over to the staircase, before deciding that surely Lardo and Chowder wouldn’t mind if he used their shower. If anything, he could always pull the “you let me sleep on the haus couch, I deserve a damn shower” card.

The second he opened the bathroom door, though, he was hit in the face with hot steam and the sound of a horribly off-key rendition of “All That Heaven Will Allow”. Who the hell was singing (read: butchering) Springsteen this early in the morning? And more importantly, who the fuck was using _his_ shower.

He got an answer to that almost immediately, as Nurse poked his head out from the shower curtain, that irritatingly serene look on his face.

“Mornin’ Sleeping Beauty,” he says with a smirk, before closing the curtain fully again. Dex can already feel the annoyance rising in his throat.

“I need to use the shower, Nurse,” he replies, his voice slightly croaky.

“Well doesn’t that just suck for you?” Nursey says with a slight laugh. “Just go use the other one.”

“The other one’s broken. It’s _been_ broken, and you know that,” Dex hisses back, before suddenly having an idea flash into his head. “Move over,” he says, starting to undress.

“Wait, what?” Nursey says as soon as he hears fabric rumpling and Dex not leaving.

“I said move over. If you won’t get out then we’re sharing.”

“Dex, I don’t know if you know how showers work but I am _naked_ in here.”

“No one cares about your dick, Nurse. Just move,” Dex says, fumbling the last of his clothes off and getting in, closing his eyes as soon as he feels the warm water hit his skin. He opens them again, only to be face to face with Nursey, the look on his face satisfyingly unchill for a second before he regains his normal composure.

“I fell asleep on the haus couch,” Dex explains, and Nursey’s face changes into one of complete understanding.

“Well, it’s been nice knowing you, bro,” he quips, before both of them freeze, hearing the door open slowly.

“Yo, Nursey, you seen Dex around here anywhere?” Holster’s voice asks from the doorway. Dex shakes his head furiously, hoping Nursey gets the message.

“Nah man, haven’t seen him.”

“Alright, cool. When you’re done can you find him and meet me and Ransom in the attic? Thanks, man,” Holster responds before the door clicks shut again.

_X_

One awkward shower and subsequent fight over whether or not Dex should use Lardo’s blow dryer on his hair later, they were both standing at the entrance to the attic. Holster was leaned up against Dex, one arm around his shoulders in an almost fatherly embrace. Rans was doing the same to Nursey beside him.

“I’m sure you’re already familiar with our inner sanctum,” Holster begins.

“So we’ll skip the formalities,” Ransom finishes, in some weird Shining-esqe display. Or maybe they just rehearsed this.

“We want you guys to have our dibs,” Holster says, smiling and moving to lean against the doorframe, facing a frankly awestruck Dex and Nursey. They had always talked about how cool getting the attic dibs would be, but they never really considered it an actual possibility.

“You guys are the only D-men we’ve had with the same level of chemistry that we have,” Rans says, gesturing to himself and Holster and smiling knowingly. “And it takes a lot of chemistry to forgive some of the things you hear when you live so close together.”

“So?” Holster asks, holding out his hand for the deal-sealing handshake and grinning even wider than he was before when Dex shakes it without a word, actually speechless for once in his life. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Nursey giving Rans a very unchill hug.

“Do hugs count for dibs?” Ransom asks out of the corner of his mouth.

“Totally, dude. Totally counts,” Holster replies.

_X_

“Oh my god, shut the fuck _up_ , please for the love of god,” Dex groans into one of his pillows, blindly tossing the other in the general direction of Nursey’s bed. He feels somewhat proud of himself when he hears a quiet yelp and something like the sound of a pillow hitting a ukulele.

“The voice of the people silenced once again,” Nursey deadpans, and Dex can hear him set the ukulele on his dresser top, counting it as somewhat of a personal victory.

“Nurse, you disgust me,” Dex says, regretting the words before they even leave his mouth, half because they’re the exact opposite of what he really thinks, and-

“Ah, so you’ve discussed me. I’m a trust fund baby, you can trust me,” Nursey croons from the other side of the room. Sometimes living with an English major was pure hell.

“I hate you.”

“No you don’t,” Nursey refutes casually, ruffling Dex’s hair as he passes by on his way to the door. Dex waits for the sound of Nursey’s feet on the stair to fade out before rolling out of bed, sleepily making his way to the downstairs bathroom. He opens the door, only to be hit in the face with steam and heat.

“Oh goddamnit,” he mutters to himself. Nursey’s head pops out from the side of the curtain, still infuriatingly chill.

“Do you just want to share, bro?” he asks, as if it’s just a casual thing, and something in Dex’s stomach twists.

“Nah, I’ll just wait, I guess,” Dex replies with a sigh, turning to leave.

“We’ve done it before,” Nursey reminds him, freezing him in his tracks. “After that one epikegster.”

“Things were different then,” Dex replies, trying to stay vague. He couldn’t just admit that somewhere along the way he’d developed feelings for Nursey, could he? Admit that he’d gone through a full week of internal crisis when he first realized that he might not be entirely straight? Admit that he’d actually talked about all of it over skype with Shitty, who’d helped him find a label that he felt comfortable with? Admit that sometimes he found himself staring at Nursey’s arms when they were both lounging around in the attic together, or staring at his back muscles in the locker room after practice and then felt guilty about it? Admit that he’d read every single one of Nursey’s published poems, even though he chirped him relentlessly for writing them in the first place?

“Yo, earth to Poindexter,” Nursey’s voice carried over through his thoughts. He was standing to Dex’s side, leaning into his field of view, seemingly fully clothed. Come to think of it, Dex couldn’t remember when he’d heard the shower stop, either. How long had he been zoned out? Nursey pushed past him, standing directly in the doorway and preventing him from leaving.

“You’re not straight, are you?” Dex blurts out, mentally cursing himself and his shitty mental filter the second he sees Nursey’s eyes narrow. Of course he was straight, why did he even bother aski-

“Bi, actually. Is that your issue? You thought I was gonna creep on you because I’m-“

“Of course not! I…I’m not straight either, Nurse.” For once, it was Nursey’s turn to be surprised and thrown off. “And I might…fuck, dude, words are hard,” Dex complains, and Nursey’s face softens as he tries to hold back a laugh.

“I might be into you. In a romantic way,” Dex finally manages to spit out, and Nursey smirks.

“Dude, you made me wait three years for you to get over your straight panic to just tell me like that?” he asks incredulously, as if he knew about Dex’s feelings the whole time and just didn’t say anything. Seemingly reading his mind, Nursey continues, “You talk about it in your sleep sometimes, but I figured you’d want to tell me yourself eventually.”

He chuckles again, before leaning forward and pressing an ironically innocent kiss to Dex’s lips. It can’t last more than a second, but it leaves Dex breathless. Nursey leans against the door frame, nodding his head once in the direction of the smell of pancakes wafting up from the kitchen.

“We’ve got all the time in the world to figure this out, but let’s go down and get breakfast first, okay? If we’re not there I’m pretty sure Bitty might kill us. Either that or the frogs will eat all the syrup again, and I’m not having that shit in my haus.”

“Yeah, sure,” Dex agrees as Nursey takes his hand and they both head downstairs. It’s only hours later that Dex realizes that he completely forgot to take a shower.


	2. the patron saint of good god damn

“So you’re…” Nursey starts nervously, later, when they’re both cross-legged and facing each other on Dex’s bed. Dex nervously pulls on a loose string on his sweatshirt sleeve before answering.

“Do you want the Shitty explanation or the regular explanation?” he asks, which breaks some of the somewhat awkward tension in the room.

“The regular explanation,” Nursey replies, with knowing certainty.

“I’m definitely bi. I think. It’s still all kinda new, y’know?” Nursey nods along as Dex talks, which reassures him that he’s at least not messing up too badly. “I…I guess I never really even considered it until I came here to Samwell.” There’s an unspoken “until I met you” at the end of that, but for some reason, Dex just can’t force the words into reality.

“We don’t have to talk about this now if you don’t want to,” Nursey says, looking everywhere except at Dex. “We can just ch-“

“Derek Malik Nurse, if you ‘chill’ me right now I might actually slap you.” Dex sighs, running a hand over his face before continuing. “Just, just let me get this off my chest. According to Shitty I was ‘so far in the closet that you were eating old dress shoes for sustenance’ for pretty much my entire life so far, so like, I need to talk about this with someone who understands.”

Nursey just nods sagely like he’s been there before. Which, now that Dex thinks about it, he probably has.

“I mean, this isn’t…I’m not poetic like you, I can’t make everything sound beautiful every time I open my mouth, so this is gonna sound kinda stupid, but-“ Nursey opens his mouth to say something, then thinks better of it, so Dex continues. “For a long time it felt like I was just missing something. It was like someone coming into your house and moving all the furniture an inch to the left. But then…then I came here to Samwell, and I joined the team and I met you,” Nursey smiles at that, and so does Dex, if only to reassure him that the next part doesn’t apply anymore.

“So I met you and I _fucking hated you_. Oh my god, I honestly think that my blood pressure freshman year was high enough to kill me most of the time you were around. But then we started to be friends, and I started to notice little things about you that I hadn’t before because I was so busy nursing my stupid grudge. Like, you’ll always pour your milk into the bowl before your cereal like some kind of heathen. And your eyes have these little gold flecks that sparkle in the sun that look really nice against the green, and you’ve got this little scar on one side of your collarbone, by the way, what is that even from?”

“I fell out of a tree when I was little and hit a couple branches on the way down. My moms nearly had a heart attack driving me to the hospital, I honestly though they were going to kill me,” Nursey explains, still listening to what Dex has to say with the utmost attention. Which is…new. But not entirely bad. Dex just nods, cataloging that little detail for later.

“So,” he continues, “it eventually got so bad that I actually called Shitty and talked to him for like, almost an hour just figuring shit out. So, that’s…that’s it, I guess.” There was so much Dex wanted to say, but for now that’d do. They had all the time in the world to talk about it all.

“You honestly would not believe the sheer number of stupid poems I wrote about you. And instead of just sitting down and talking about it,” Nursey sighs, “I just tried to compartmentalize shit. Tried to pretend that I didn’t feel the way I did about you.” He looks up, smiling sadly. “Didn’t work.”

“God, we’re a bunch of fucking idiots, aren’t we?” Dex says with a breathy laugh. “We wasted so much time-“

“We didn’t waste anything,” Nursey cuts in, reaching over and putting a hand over Dex’s, twining their fingers together. “We were still together. Still friends.”

“Yeah, but it wasn’t like this. Things have been so…so _different_ , even just today. I never want to spend another day not with you. I mean, not like, physically, I mean…you know what I meant.”

“Dex, babe, just chill,” Nursey says, and for once the word doesn’t make Dex irrationally angry, it actually makes him…chill? “We could get a place in Providence, after Samwell, if you wanted to. Be near Bitty and Jack and Rans and Holtz and the rest of the guys, y’know? I can work on my writing, and you can get a job at a startup or something, and…yeah,” Nursey trails off, obviously trying to curb his own lack of chill.

“You really thought about this a lot, didn’t you?” Dex asks, slightly in awe of how far ahead Nursey was thinking, and at the same time very aware of the blush rising in his face.

“It started out as daydreams, mostly. Just, y’know, ‘this might be nice one day’ sort of stuff,” Nursey admits, his face heating slightly too.

“You’re cute when you’re embarrassed,” Dex says, and Nursey looks up at him, almost surprised.

“Bro, chill,” he mutters, his face getting even more red. Dex leans forward and kisses him, soft and slow, and Nursey melts into it without a moment’s hesitation. Minutes later, when they finally fully break apart, Dex’s phone goes off in his pocket. He pulls it out to check it and immediately starts giggling.

“What? What is it?” Nursey asks, confused. Dex simply hands him the phone, explaining as he reads.

“I texted Shitty earlier and this is what he replied with.”

_“Congradulations to William Jacqueline Poindexter, Destroyer of Chill, for finally getting your shit together. Ya did good kiddo.”_

“Is your middle name really Jacqueline?”

“No, it’s actually Jonathan, but I don’t think Shitty knows that,” Dex replies as Nursey hands him his phone back.

“Jonathan, huh? That’s cute.”

“You’re cute.”

“Shut up, Poindexter,” Nursey replies, his face heating up again.

“Why don’t you make me, Nurse?” Dex challenges. Mere seconds later, Bitty yells up the staircase that the pies are ready if they want any.

“Pie first?” Nursey asks cautiously.

“Always pie first,” Dex agrees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> are the chapter and fic titles referencing my favorite [modern baseball](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aE-M8keU528) song? yes. am i ashamed of this fact? nope. its good though, you should give it a listen!

**Author's Note:**

> so [heres](http://reysimmons.tumblr.com/post/143454363592/okay-but-imagine-dex-and-nursey-getting-into-one) credit for the absolutely lovely hamilton headcanon i used (does that hyperlink work? im garbage at html, im sorry) 
> 
> also im legitimately crying, ive never felt so wonderful about posting fic to a fandom, like, ya'll are great tbh


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